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Thursday, March 03, 2011

a magical toy shop in berlin

back in september in berlin, just a couple of doors down from the apartment where we stayed, there was a magical little toy shop. it was stuffed from floor to ceiling with toys new and old. in the back was a bearded man who sat in a lair repairing toys. he was surrounded by drawers of supplies - eyes, little screws, small wheels, any bit or bob that a toy might need. did you get that? someone was repairing toys? instead of throwing them away! isn't that magical?

the proprietor was a real toy geek. he was intense in that way that only a geek who really burns for his particular geekdom can be. he was such a geek in fact, that i suspect he lived in the back of the shop. and he seemed harmless enough, tho' when he tried to usher us into the basement through an alice-sized tiny door to ostensibly see his collection of east german toys, he did seem slightly less harmless. we declined.

my favorite bit was his wide selection of little tin replicas of the old-fashioned mechanical toys. i bought several robots and this magical little ferris wheel. it has a key that you wind and then it turns around.

it was the kind of store that gives you hope for the world. hope that it won't all be taken over by the giants - toys r us, wal-mart and the like - hope that there is a place still left in the world for magic. and wonder. and a bit of geekiness. and where they repair toys instead of throwing them out. but maybe that's just berlin.

There is something so magical about a toy store (not a Toys R Us kind of toy store, but a REAL toy store). It's the same thing with bookstores ... and sometimes I wonder why so-called "progress" has led us so far from that magic ...

I'm not a toy fan by any means and I was skeptical about the shop until I saw the ferris wheel. It's gorgeous! I hope that little place of magic can stay open until I can get a ticket to Berlin. Thank you so much for sharing!